(pair of mirrors)

For Esmé shot by Petra Collins

Kathleen Edwards - “Chameleon/Comedian” 

Voyageur

The title of this album is Voyageur, but it may as well be Canadiana. Not the Broken Toronto Social Scene Canadiana, Montreal Arcade-Fire avant-garde, or Vancouverite New Pornographers musical collective. Kathleen Edwards’ music is more in the spirit of this land’s famous small towns: Peterborough, Winnipeg, Grand Manan, Moose Jaw, Nanaimo. Just like these towns, Voyageur is not new, or groundbreaking, or terribly exciting. It is not an album you can easily call “interesting.” Yet it has a quiet beauty about it that is at once intoxicating and entirely inexplicable.

On Voyageur, Edwards showcases her ability to write simple, stirring songs. The songs are in fact so simple that, at first listen, they can appear almost bland. There is really no “secret ingredient” in her music, and her general “sound” is about 5-8 years too late (see, for instance, the background Shania-like sha-la-las on “Mint”). And yet, Voyageur will burrow. After a couple of listens, you will wake up craving Voyageur in the middle of the night. The “Chameleon/Comedian” lyrical interplay will go from “yeah, I get it” to “wow, that’s genius”. The punch line of “For the Record” - “for the record, I only wanted to sing songs” - will become the most disarming of proclamations. I honestly don’t know what it is about Voyageur, I don’t know what makes it so stunning. A transient, elusive spirit runs through the album, and that spirit will make itself known to the listener over time. 

With Voyageur, Kathleen Edwards’ is beginning to establish her place in the Canadian music family. Most notably, it is evident that Edwards is the next in line of the great Canadian female singer-songwriters: Alanis Morissette, Sarah Harmer, Christine Fellows, and Sarah McLachlan. She is also much like her other co-patriots, Neil Young and John K. Samson, in that the simplicity and the seeming mundaneness of her songs is the very reason for their greatness. Above all, the stunning Voyageur is proof that the “old-school” style of singing-songwriting is alive and well in This Great Land. 

And don’t go looking for Justin Vernon on this album. Voyageur is all Kathleen. 

-L

Norah Jones - Little Broken Hearts 

“Little Broken Hearts” 

This is not the Norah Jones you know and love. This is not multiple Grammy-winner Norah Jones. This is not your dinner-party smooth-jazz Norah Jones, or Strabucks Norah Jones, or on-repeat-in-your-mom’s-car Norah Jones. 

Make no mistake - those who liked the old Norah Jones will not like Little Broken Hearts. But those who were not so enthused with songs like “Don’t Know Why” will find Little Broken Hearts to be a realization of this Texas girl’s country-blues-folk potential. 

It is not difficult to guess what inspired Little Broken Hearts: a break-up. Somewhere around Christmas of 2007, Jones split up with her long-term dude slash musical partner Lee Alexander. Instead of working with Alexander on Little Broken Hearts, Jones teamed with two absolute rock-star producers: Daniele Luppi and Danger Mouse, the very guys who released Rome with Jones and Jack White back in 2011. In their own right,  Luppi is well known for his cinematic scoring work, while Danger Mouse is an absolute legend, having produced everyone from Beck to the Black Keys. 

At the forefront of Little Broken Hearts is, well, Jones’ breakup. Throughout the entire album, Jones’ lyrics provide insight into the inner workings of her heart, as well as the catastrophe which it suffered: “She’s 22 and she’s loving you / And you’ll never know how it makes me blue / Does she make you happy?” from “She’s 22”, or “Words spoken silently / I could never understand / How breath delivers such poison / To someone too weak to stand” from “Take It Back”. In terms of themes and content, Little Broken Hearts is much like Adele’s 21: if you invest a little time into listening to the album as a whole, you will discover exactly what happened that fateful Christmas of ‘07. At some point there was love, then there was betrayal (“She’s 22”), there was uncertainty (“Good Morning”), there was regret (“Say Goodbye”), there was loss (“Little Broken Hearts”), there was anger (“Happy Pills”), and finally there was a new beginning (“Out on the Road”). Oh and, at one point, Jones murdered this chick called Miriam, who may or may not have been getting it on with said long-term dude (see “Miriam”). 

Yet a lot of credit has to be given to Luppi and Danger Mouse. While Jones’ lyrics in themselves are cutting, the song execution takes Little Broken Hearts to a new level. The hush, whispery tone of Jones’ voice on the title track, the way it is accompanied by a lonely, monotone guitar, the minor piano chords and ghostly backup singers which intersperse throughout, make “Little Broken Hearts” positively terrifying. Lee Alexander is definitely losing it somewhere. Then there are songs like “Good Morning” and “She’s 22” where there is almost no instrumentation - Norah Jones’ voice is powerful enough as it is, and Luppi and Danger Mouse do well not to obstruct it. My favourite touch, however, is the constant presence of a lil’ bit of country twang: the slide guitar on “Take it Back”, the easy strums of “Out on the Road”, the hush, layered bass on “All a Dream”. Daniele Luppi and Danger Mouse finally figured out that Norah Jones is not a watered-down jazz singer, and for that, they deserve a great deal of credit. 

-L 

John K Samson – Provincial

“Heart of the Continent”

Many albums, many very good albums, operate on a very simple strategy – they make you live a dream.  Last year, albums like Watch the Throne and Take Care played out a millionaire’s fantasy in their listeners’ minds, while those listeners’ pockets were becoming more and more depleted (“25 sitting on 25 mil”, anyone?). There are albums that are dreams of earth-shattering, mythical, out-of-this world love – The Decemberists’ Hazards of Love and The Morning Benders’ Big Echo are perfect examples.  On the flipside, there are albums that plunge the listener into the nightmarish darkness of the artists’ mind – in themselves a certain kind of dream – that make you reconsider all that existential poetry you wrote after your last breakup. I’m thinking here of For Emma, Forever Ago, of My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, Alligator by the National, and much of Emily Haines’ solo work, just to name a few. And then, there are albums that just allow you to get a glimpse of what it would be like to be in the artist’s shoes – i.e., pretty much everything by Old Crow Medicine Show, Let England Shake by PJ Harvey, Acid Tongue by Jenny Lewis, or The Harrow and the Harvest by Gillian Welch.

In simple terms, many albums seek to take you away from yourself; to provide you with a fantasy. While this is admirable and likely necessary occupation for musicians, one man, John K. Samson, has always sought to attain a different end through his music. Whether with his seminal Canadian band The Weakerthans, or though his solo work , Samson has sought to say no, you don’t need to go outside yourself to see beauty, to see meaning, to see love. The ingredients for those feelings are already present within you – they are a priori to your very existence - and it is not a change in these ingredients but a different way of looking at them that will produce freedom, beauty, love.

I have to preface – if you can call 3 paragraphs deep into a piece prefacing – by admitting that John K. Samson is, quite uncontestably, my favorite songwriter of all time. My love for his music is long and strong. It began with my fascination as a 13-year old with “One Great City” a.k.a. “I Hate Winnipeg”, and a subsequent very strong, now ten-year desire to actually travel to Winnipeg one of these days (yes, like a pilgrimage). When thinking about the impact of Samson’s music on me, I’m always reminded of Emma Thomson’s observation about Joni Mitchell in the movie “Love Actually”: “Joni Mitchell taught your cold English wife how to love”. Although I can’t say that I in any way partake in the identity of a “cold English wife” (at least not yet), John Samson’s music, as music should, has taught me how to love. And not just love in the romantic sense, although that certainly figures, but love for all things big and small: the way that winter dies the same way every spring; the clash of sadness and optimism when you’re facing a sun in an empty room; the simple warmth of all kinds of nostalgia, like a fire door that we kept propping open; and how good it is sometimes to just hang out, with someone good – to sit and watch the wall, you painted purple. I’m going to stop now even though I don’t want to (for your sake), but I could really go on for pages.

(A funny/irrelevant aside – just last night, as I was hanging out with my significant other, with this piece on my mind, the lyric popped into my mind and I just blurted out: “I’m so glad that you exist!” This was followed by a well-deserved “aw” from the said other, at which point I had to confess: “Actually, that’s a John Samson line.” Unfortunately my other is not (yet!) as versed in his JKS as me, and somewhat indignantly, he went “Who’s John Samson!”, thinking that he’s some random dude. Anyway, no worries and I have since cleared up who Johns Samson is.)

On January 24, 2012, the new Samson album, titled, ever-so-aptly, Provincial, was finally released to the masses. For me, the album represented a whole new field of dreams – an opportunity for twelve more songs to become complete beloveds.In the weeks leading up to the album I listened incessantly to The Weakerthans and to Samson’s other solo work, distilling his lyrical work to its fundamental components. On Provincial, I was hoping to find a continuation of the same trusty themes that permeate Samson’s work – winter, hockey, memories, Canada, hospitals, highways, cats, love, curling, regret, life, and of course, Winnipeg – a city for small lives. Above all, I wanted new thoughtful Samson songs to sink my teeth into, new tunes to play and level with for years to come.

Man, were my prayers ever answered. By the time I got to the end of the opener, “Highway 1 East”, I was hooked. The song is about driving east, and letting your mind get lost, on the Trans-Canada: Scratch Saskatchewan away/ Make Manitoba paper dolls/ Lift up a lie from highway 1/ To tie Ontario.

“Heart of the Continent”, the album’s second track, is a Samson classic . The story of the song goes something like this: some time in 2008, the city of Winnipeg went ahead and re-branded itself. For years, Winnipeg greeted its drivers with “Winnipeg: One Great City.” However, as of 2008, Winnipeg became more into seeing itself as the “Heart of the Continent”, and it changed its welcome signs appropriately. Of course, this made Samson’s quintessential Winnipeg track “One Great City”, (you know, the “I Hate Winnipeg” ode to the town), rather out of date. The new Winnipeg tune, “Heart of the Continent”, appears on Provincial.  The song is a brooding and thoughtful little number, both about Winnipeg, and not. The key lyric is near the end – There’s a billboard on the highway/ That says “Welcome to – Bienvenue” / But no sign to show you when you go away”.

Is Samson just talking about Winnipeg, reflecting on the town’s desire to affect and change itself through this seemingly meaningless gesture? Or is he talking about so many other things? Maybe he’s saying, isn’t it funny, isn’t it just so human, that so many of us do the same thing as Winnipeg on a fairly regular basis? We rebrand, we make new signs. We think our new job, new home, new year, new hobby, new friends, new love will change us, will make us new, different – but in reality these things are often simply signage changes, hanging on the exterior of the same old you. But beyond that rather depressing thought, as there always is with Samson, there’s a tentative good, a fragile lesson, a shaky exclamation mark. When you start feeling like, goddammit, you’re going to run out of new signs soon, is the point when you forget about the signs and start appreciating what they stand for. For Samson in “Heart of the Continent”, it’s looking at how shitty Winnipeg can be – north wind sinks the fence around a lot full of debris/ Near the corner of Memorial and me – and extracting from this rather grim setting an implicit, transcendent beauty. He’s confirming the age-old truism that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. So if you really want to see it – in Winnipeg, or in you – then you will.

Another absolutely stand-out song on Provincial is “Letter in Icelandic From Ninnette San”. This is a different kind of Samson classic. Here, Samson shows his abilities as a true poet, spinning words that flow like milk and honey from one verse to the next. You don’t ever get to find out what this song is really about – there’s a hospital involved, vague references to Icelandic epics, and persons known only to John. But that doesn’t really matter. What matters is that this song, with Samson’s endearing, slightly nasally voice and the shuffle drums that remind oh-so-much of “Fallow”, is as close to perfect as they come:

Bev Monroe and his panel of alley boys play at the party

And I practice my English on nurses, “oh that’s a nice name”.

And they may ask me for mine, but the burns on my back from the x-rays,

Say I shouldn’t show anyone anything ever again.

On “The Last And”, another shuffling beauty, Samson spins a tale of a staff-room love gone wrong. His descriptions are so deep and so touching, that one cannot help but feel for the downcast, probably somewhat chubby, substitute teacher protagonist: When your voice springs from the intercom/With announcements, and reminders, and prayers/ I remember how you made me feel/ I was funny, I was thoughtful, I was rare. The song culminates in simple words laden with unspeakable burdens: I know I’m just your little ampersand. 

In contrast, songs like “Petition” and “When I Write My Master’s Thesis” provide light reprisals during the album’s heavier moments. On “Master’s Thesis”, John tells a story of a grad student whose whole life, seemingly, will unfurl in a rainbow of awesomeness once he finally gets down to writing his Master’s thesis: No more marking, first-years’ papers/No more citing sources, sources, sour-ces! In similar vein, “Petition” is a song which looks to induct Reggie ‘The Riverton Rifle’ Leach into the Hockey Hall of Fame. The song doubles as an online petition, which can be found and signed here: http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/rivertonrifle/donate. A chorus of what I can only imagine to be proud Winnipegans (ians?) accompany Samson throughout the song with one monotonic demand: We, the undersigned, put forth his name, to the Hockey Hall of Fame.

At the end of the day, Provincial is an absolutely sublime effort, and one which is long overdue from Canada’s best songwriter. Here, John K. Samson manages to be both moving and gentle, poignant yet effortless. He has, once again, come up with easy songs that talk about hard things, good things, bad things, and just things – a beautiful portrayal of just another day in the life of an average (Canadian) you. 

To be completely honest, I think Provincial is John Samson’s best work to date.

-L 

#1. Bon Iver - Bon Iver 

“Michicant” 

The year 2011 produced a perfect album.

Bon Iver is the artist whose legacy with outlive us all. Years from now, he will be up there with Bob Dylan, Neil Young, and Nick Drake. Bon Iver is the ultimate modern songwriter – he is at once cryptic, passionate, complicated, versatile, and profound.

The most incredible thing of all is that in 2011 Bon Iver resisted the urge to remain Bon Iver. The songs from his 2008 debut For Emma, Forever Ago, in light of this year’s self-titled release, seem infinitely dwarfed. Before 2011, I would classify as quintessential Bon Iver songs like “Skinny Love” and “Re: Stacks”. These songs from For Emma were gritty, guitar-ridden spectacles of a broken heart. They were painful and sometimes even unbearable. Justin Vernon’s sadness on those songs was infectious and overwhelming, but the music itself, while in many ways very creative, was nowhere near this year’s Bon Iver.

Bon Iver is not an album about love – it’s an album about life. That is the biggest difference from 2008’s For Emma. Sometimes Bon Iver isabout the nostalgia and the sadness of life, but at the same time it’s about the power that can be drawn from those moments. There are lines on Bon Iver that can be interpreted in a million different ways – “I can see for miles and miles and miles,” for instance, or “and at once I knew, I was not magnificent”. It’s a kind of album that seems enchanted and dreamlike – the way it transitions from movement to stillness, from silence to sound. Every single song on Bon Iver contains an infinite number of layers. Every time you listen to the songs, you feel like you’ve peeled back one more layer, you feel like you’re that much closer to the very heart of Vernon’s voice, and to its meaning.

If I could describe Bon Iver in one sentence it would be that the album is the very manifestation of a living, breathing, human being’ soul. It’s the brain, the heart, and the body combined, within one devastatingly perfect 40-minute package.

-L 

#2. Timber Timbre - Creep On Creeping On

“Bad Ritual”

I haven’t shut up about Timber Timbre all year. Three shows, three blog posts, and an absolutely astounding number of plays, Creep On Creepin’ On will forever be remembered as the soundtrack of my 2011. I know you aren’t surprised. 

One thing I have noticed since falling in love with this album is how much I hear its dark influence finding its way into other things. You can hear that creepiness creeping on along into albums like Watch The Throne (listen to the end of No Church In the Wild and tell me that doesn’t sound like a Taylor Kirk influence). Timber Timbre has started something that isn’t going to stop. 

Creep On Creepin’ On is such an impressively cohesive whole. It is the perfect blend of old familiar and nostalgic sounds yet it is so perfectly new, unique and noteably different. It is full of subtle themes, instrumentally, melodically and lyrically that all fit together so perfectly—flowing in and out of one another, reminding us over and over what Timber Timbre is all about. I have come to seriously adore each and every track on this album so very very much, but it is without a doubt best heard as a whole, as the Timber Timbre experience. 

I don’t want to go on and on about this, because we have done that a lot this year. You can read about why we love Timber Timbre here, here or here. 

Creep On Creepin’ On has however made me feel a vast spectrum of things this year and the juxtapostition of those feelings is quite striking. I will share a few things that this album has made me feel, which includes but is not limited to fear, comfort, hypnosis, goosepumps, hope, sadness, joy and above all, inspiration. Creep On Creepin’ On has become, for me, a ritual in and of itself. 

It’s a bad bad ritual, but it calms me down. 

-M

#3. tUnE-yArDs - w h o k i l l 

“My Country” 

You’ve never heard music that sounds like Tune-Yards before, which in many ways is the reason for Whokill’s high placement on this year’s countdown. Tune-Yards manages to marry fierce experimental pop with insatiable listenability. Songs like “Bizness” and “Gangsta” are funky and creative to the core. You’re never quite sure if what you’re listening to is the chorus, bridge, or verse - no such definitions exist in front woman Merrill Garbus’ musical universe. And yet, what ends up happening is that the words, guitars, hooks, drums, beats, and whatever else you hear on Whokill, blend and mingle together to create a massive, catchy, 42-minute party anthem. 

Whokill sounds like all the musical genres got together and had a dance party. Parts of Whokill sound like Dirty Projectors, Lauryn Hill, Micachu, Animal Collective, Braids, Erykah Badu, Beyonce, and Lady Gaga. Yet, the biggest achievement of Whokill is not the endless juxtaposition and amalgamation of musical genres - after all, that has been done before - but rather the fact that Garbus has managed to do it in a catchy and listenable way. No longer is experimental pop only for people who like weird music! No longer is experimental pop frowned at at a party! No longer is it somewhat tedious to listen to experimental pop! Tune-Yards put an end to all such pre-conceptions with Whokill, a pop album that is both weird and wonderful, eccentric yet accessible. 

It’s the pop sound of the future. 

-L

#5. Lykke Li - Wounded Rhymes

“Youth Knows No Pain”

It’s a great feeling when an artist you really like comes out with a second, even better, even more impressive album. Such is the case with Lykke Li. She is getting better with age.Youth Novels was one of my favourite albums in university, but Wounded Rhymes is full of new insights, danceable tunes, reflective ballads and sing along songs. She did it again, but even better.  Lykke seems to have grown up a lot from Youth Novels, and she says now, “Youth Knows No Pain”. 

The success of Lykke Li is really exciting for me. The way Wounded Rhymes seems to be borderline mainstream says a lot to me about where music is headed. It seems the indie, the intelligent, the innovative, is on the up and up. Good music is finally starting to get the attention and ticket sales they deserve. It’s so refreshing to see a talented pop singer like Lykke selling out huge venues in Toronto and everywhere else. She is clever, talented, beautiful, and writes undeniably good songs. When you’re listening to Wounded Rhymes there is definitely no denying that music can be catchy and intelligent at the same time. She’s the mastermind behind these fantastic pop tunes.  Its this level of accessibility and the stomp along sing along quality of Lykke Li’s engaging songwriter that makes her the reigning indie queen in my books. And right along side those catchy singalong songs are gentle, sad, pretty and quiet ones too. 

I admire the way Lykke writes from this poignant perspective of being a smart and beautiful woman. It’s so brutally and beautifully honest. Songs like Rich Kid Blues and Get Some are both provocative and catchy, without seeming in the least bit over the top. I think she is an inspiring woman in the music scene and is going places even bigger than she’s been in 2011. 

L and I often have trouble agreeing on which albums deserve which spots on our countdowns, but since Wounded Rhymes came out we both knew it held a special place both in our hearts and on the countdown. We’ve enjoyed this album together and apart, recorded and live. It was an obvious choice from the get go. 

-M

#6. Destroyer - Kaputt

“Chinatown” 

Kaputt is a weird little album. First of all, you will never find cohesive, non-nonsensical lyricism on Kaputt. Every line uttered by Dan Bejar on Kaputt seems to emerge from the dark and mysterious depths of his brain. It’s a free association game at its finest. Lines like “I wrote a song for America, they told me it was clever,” followed by “Jessica’s gone on vacation on the dark side of town forever” from “Song For America” make you just sit and wonder where on earth that came from. Another good line is from “Chinatown”: “The wind and the rain: to your detriment you try to explain / The government swallowed up in the squall / I can’t walk away, at all - in Chinatown”. 

On top of the above-mentioned lyrical free-for-all comes a side of musical accompaniment that is decidedly stuck in the eighties. And not just eighties in general, but the cheesiest of eighties. Suave smooth-jazzy soprano saxes and clarinets accompany Bejar’s voice on “Chinaown” and “Downtown.” Light percussions and snazzy synths dominate “Savage Night at the Opera”. Easy listening flutes provide the melody for “Suicide Demo for Kara Walker.” In the words of my ever-wise boyfriend: “They kind of sound like Pet Shop Boys.” 

On paper, Kaputt as an album should not add up to much. And yet the eighties-ness of the music, the whimsical subject matter, and the nonchalance of Bejar’s voice as well as his fake British accent all combine to make a brilliantly light album, one which borders on ironic, sarcastic, and, well, insane. 

-L